Alabama Football vs Western Kentucky: Preview and Predictions

A new season has dawned and Alabama kicks off against the Western Kentucky Hilltoppers. Alabama played the Hilltoppers in 2008, 2012, and 2016, with Alabama winning easily each time, although that 2016 team, coached by Jeff Brohm, was very dangerous and limited Alabama to a 28-point victory. You may remember that game as the one where Blake Barnett got a second chance after losing his job to Jalen Hurts against USC the week before… and was out of reach again.

Eight years later, the Tide finally takes on the Hilltoppers again.

A lot has changed since then, with coach Tyson Helton taking over in 2019 looking to bounce back from a couple of truly awful years. It took him two seasons to fix the issues, but since the 2021 season, WKU has had one of the best passing offenses in the country every year.

Bailey Zappe made headlines a few years ago, but the Tops have still thrown for over 8,000 yards the past two seasons with a guy named Austin Reed. Their offense is ultimately part of the Bobby Petrino offensive scheme, as Petrino taught it to Jeff Brohm at Louisville, who then taught it to Helton at WKU.

And of course, Petrino drew his inspiration in his early years largely from a combination of Mike Price, Dennis Erickson and Nevada's Chris Ault, the inventor of the pistol formation and the only madman cool enough to build an entire offensive game around it.

Petrino was essentially part of the first real wave that made the spread offense a thing in college football, and now it's largely the same scheme that almost everyone uses.

At Western Kentucky, Helton has moved away from the power spread aspect of the Petrino Line and is focusing more on passing the ball. However, he still uses different WR and TE formations and mixups to make things more similar to what you saw under Lincoln Riley at Oklahoma and USC.

I'll give you a great example, Lincoln Riley, one of the best in the business. You look at him, I mean a third of the offense every week he's playing 12-person, Helton said. I think about Lane Kiffin and what he does at Ole Miss and he's a great offensive mind, but he's still going to play tight end at times. Maybe a little more 11, not 12, but he's going to do that. There's a time and a place for everything, you just have to know when to use it.

Playing two tight ends in this instance allows Helton and the offense to alternate their playmaking while keeping the defense on their toes.

I think it's easier for the quarterback, number one. When I say multiple, you've got to be able to play with a tight end, you've got to be able to get the formation to the boundary, you've got to have movement to get the safety rotation. All of those things play into that to get what you want the defense to do, whether you're running the ball or throwing the ball. So, those are really all the things that we're looking at that aren't really air raid principles that Helton explained. [Air raid] I would just play four wide, go fast, and let the quarterback have the keys to the Ferrari, and let him go. We got lucky last year with Bailey, who is so damn good, you can do that a lot, but we played three games last year, we had to slow down, and we had to look at the defense, see what they were giving us. We had to mix run, pass, play action, that's what good football teams do and we've got to do it again this year.

But don't call it an air raid.

In 2024, the Hilltoppers will start with a brand new QB — a man named TJ Finley. If that name doesn’t immediately ring a bell, the towering QB played Alabama twice in 2020 and 2022 as a starter for both LSU and Auburn before transferring to Texas State in 2023. Finley delivered the most prolific passing performance in TSU history and has now transferred back to WKU. Somehow, he’s still only a junior. I don’t know how that works anymore.

At WR, the Hilltoppers lost stud Malachi Corley to the 3rd round of the NFL draft, but they get back a pair of guys with 40+ receptions last season in senior Dalvin Smith (preseason first-team All-CUSA) and sophomore Easton Messer. They also signed Koy Moore from the transfer portal, who apparently just likes playing with TJ Finley. Moore started at LSU, then spent two seasons at Auburn. For what it’s worth, he caught 1 pass for 17 yards against Bama in 2022.

Michael Mathison also returns after missing the entire 2023 season due to injury. Two seasons ago, he was a 50+ receptions player.

They also have RB Elijah Young back for a second year. The former Missouri RB had 104 carries for WKU last season and added 247 yards as a receiver out of the backfield.

Defense

Defensively, the Hilltoppers have a terrible defense… BUT, they've averaged over two turnovers per game for three straight seasons (something Nick Saban has only accomplished in 2009, 2010, 2012, and 2019). They're prone to breaking for huge plays, and they generally struggle to stop the run. But boy, do they break on passes. Whether it's deflections or interceptions, their DBs are always looking for routes to jump, and they get their hands on the ball all the time.

Nickel corner Upton Stout is a first-team All-CUSA and former Freshman All-American with two years of starting experience and is on the Thorpe Award watch list after recording three defensive scores in the last two seasons. He's the top dog on this defense, and definitely the player to watch.

Prediction

Ultimately, the lack of a rushing defense will doom the Hilltoppers against Alabama. While I'm sure the Tide will have plenty of trouble testing a new passing game, they'll likely rely on the run in the second quarter, which will be the majority of the game.

On the other hand, I can see WKU getting more yards than we're used to against a Tide secondary that's pretty much new. I think Alabama's defense will be opportunistic and get a lot of stops, but there will also be some misfires that will lead to some hand-wringing.

Alabama takes an early 3-score lead with a series of planned attacks, but things get a bit sluggish in the second and early third quarters and WKU scores a few points before Alabama decides the game in the final third quarter.

Final score – 41-17